Movies

Pilgrimages

3x52' / 2001

Fransi De Villar Dille & Oranne Mounition

Beyond cultures and religions, pilgrimages represent an important time in the inner lives of believers. This series of three documentary films is dedicated to them. It is centred around three questions: "What is the common symbol that is within the different pilgrimages in the world? What motivates the pilgrim to travel on roads and what is his/her experience? What are these phenomena's political and economic stakes?"

The directors share with us their personal vision on the subject, sensitive and close, making the man, the pilgrim, a reference point, filmed with respect and the wish to understand his progress.

SHARED PATHS

This first film takes us to different holy places on the planet that constitute many destinations for pilgrims of various confessions : Croagh Patrick in Ireland, Rocío in Spain, Isé in Japan, Bedni in the Himalayas, Varanasi, Andhra Pradesh, Timuralaï, and Bodh-Gayâ in India… Pilgrimages share a universal symbolic : tests, rituals, and common stages, that help the pilgrim to discover his/her own inner path.

HE WHO REACHES THE OTHER BANK

In Sanskrit, the word "pilgrim" means "he who reaches the other bank". In fact, a pilgrimage can be like the crossing of a river with the perils involved. Of course, it is the internal geography that the pilgrim crosses, and a true initiation route. In this second film we follow a group of pilgrims on their way to Medjugorje (Bosnia), one of the more recent destinations of Christians since the Virgin Mary appeared to young children. Parallel to this, we are invited to cross rivers, plains and mountains, accompanying a walker travelling alone on the Island of Shikoku : that is where one of the most ancient pilgrimages in Japan takes place.

BEHIND THE SACRED

This third film takes us to the following places of cult : Isé (Japan), Lourdes (France), Fatima (Portugal), La Mecque (Saudi Arabia), Touba (Senegal), Santiago de Compostelle (Spain) Sarnath (India). It puts emphasis on the economic and political stakes that are often present in sacred places, on commerce, that appears around them and on the strategic importance they assume.